


Dressing Gowns and downtown

by AimlesslyAinley



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Emotional Baggage, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, I think its sort of a reader insert, Past Abuse, Reader-Insert, Smoking, a friendly visit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-14
Packaged: 2019-02-13 00:02:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12971301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AimlesslyAinley/pseuds/AimlesslyAinley
Summary: A reader insert fic, where on an early morning walk, after being accostted by Autons, the Doctor rescues you, and over coffee, finds out that you've got a few loose ends that could put the earth into peril.And just for good measure, the Master shows up at some point later.





	1. Not so Sunny side up- Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is going to be the first fanfic I write in probably almost a decade, and the first ever to be posted publicly. I write scripts and tidbits in my daily life, but I seldom dip my toe into fanfic.  
> I welcome *constructive criticism*, and its also been a few years since I took an English class, so some things might be a tad weird.  
> I also really like commas, and I never know if I'm using too many or not.  
> I hope you enjoy this 5th Doctor/Reader insert. its my favorite type of story to read, and it doesn't always make sense canonically, but its for pleasure, not correctness, so don't come at me with a "well actually you'll find" 
> 
> xx T

You startle awake, another nightmare. Nightmares aren’t a new thing to you, but your body doesn’t seem to get used to it. You lay in bed, staring into a pillow, trying to calm down your breathing and heart rate, it wasn’t going to be an easy night. Pulling the blankets tighter, you sigh, closing your eyes hoping to get to sleep, but are only greeted by the terrors lurking just around the corner in your mind. Opening your eyes once again, you sit up, grabbing your phone.  
‘Almost five am, no messages, and nothing going on anywhere, as usual.’ You internally roll your eyes at yourself, your phone only rings after you’ve reached out to someone, and you have been rather quiet lately. Sitting in the inky navy darkness of early winter mornings, you attempt to make a plan for the day, since you knew sleep wasn’t going to happen. Your small, bare except for a few figures and a piece of art, room that you were renting was nice enough. You couldn’t really complain, after living alone for so long in small, hole in the wall apartments in shady neighborhoods, living in a house with roommates wasn’t so bad. You’ve been renting the room for a few months now and the gentleman who owned the house used to be a coworker, when you worked at a local chain of comic book stores. There was only 4 stores in the whole state, your coworkers liked you, you got along with most customers, and management liked you. Until they fired you out of the blue, given some haphazard excuse. That was three weeks ago, and it still hurt. There was also another roommate you lived with, she wasn’t as great unfortunately. Between her late night viewings of talk shows with the TV turned up, with your room right next to the living room, loud phone calls or just her being a really poor person to live with, it was her whining about how much she’s making at work. It is all tedious and boring to you though, since getting fired, and spending a week hiding under blankets and from society in general, you have spent the last two weeks working on art. As an aspiring filmmaker spending hours lost in your mind, writing scripts, imagining the best stories and attempting to write them down, you find yourself taking walks a lot throughout the days.  
You’ve decided on it, you get out of bed, pull on the cord to the ceiling light, and walk to the attached bathroom. You’ve been thankful for this small feature, even if it is just a toilet and a sink, you don’t have to walk downstairs to get water when the whole house is asleep. Turning on the taps, waiting for the water to warm up, you look at yourself in the mirror, and as expected, you look ashen and worn out. After freshening up, and fixing your hair enough to look okay with a hat over it, you pull on some clothes, throw a few things into a small bag, pull on some outerwear, scoop up your keys and go to head downstairs.  
The blue of dawn was crawling across the windows now, creating sinisterly dark shadows with an odd space-like blue light penetrating everything. Gently pushing your door open, to avoid the hinges screaming out, alerting the house of your movement, you tiptoe out, moving towards the back door of the house. Whilst gently walking across aged wooden floors, there is a sudden scurry, causing you to let out a small yelp before realizing it is the cat Winston. After appeasing the too friendly feline, filling up a water bottle in the kitchen on your way, the cold winter air frisks your exposed skin, causing your flesh to create goosebumps. Taking a deep breath, you walk towards the alleyway that links the block of houses together. Despite living in the area for almost a decade now, you still couldn’t understand why this area was so suburban despite it being so close to the heart of the city.  
The sky was partially overcast, letting the blue light of dawn come through, and the ethereal orange lights from the sodium vapor lamps dotting the streets made the narrow alley feel like a dream, which in this case, was not the most comforting thing. You rummage around in your pocket as you walk, pulling out a cigarette and a lighter, pausing only briefly to light the cigarette before continuing on. Out of the corner of your eye, you see someone walking towards the alley from one of the houses, many of these walkways from the alley to the houses has rubbish bins lining it, and you assume this person is taking out rubbish and chose to avoid any sort of social contact. As you near the end of the alley, a side street at cutting through the well placed and perfectly groomed houses in this neighborhood, you pause for a second, hearing ice crunch behind you. As you turn your head to check to make sure you weren’t going to get run over by a car, you see what at first glance looks like a rogue Old Navy mannequin leaning against a garden wall, and upon turning half way to get a better look at it, you realize it is way *more* than that but you can’t figure out how. The creature thing wobbles on the ice, arms outstretched as if it wanted to give you a stiff hug, but not once making a sound. Looking further behind it, seeing movement, you notice a grey shape stiffly moving towards your direction as well. Your mouth is open, cigarette in hand, the most you could muster for a noise is a half-hearted goose sound as you half shuffle towards the street behind you.  
As you feel your foot nearly hitting the edge of the sidewalk, unable to turn away from the unsettling jerky movements of the things that are moving towards you, a hand firmly grabs your elbow. You shoot your head in the direction of the hand, unsure of what is going on anymore, and you see a man near your age, his blond mop of hair messed up, his face pink from cold, he’s breathless.  
“We have to get you out of here, come on!” His voice soft, but demanding, the distress nipping at the edges of it. Before you can say or even protest, the man is pulling you along, your mind racing as you run down the sidewalk with him. You two run, or more accurately speed walk on the ice, for a few blocks, before he stops at an alleyway that sits behind some small stores. He pulls you down the alley before stopping in front of a blue phone box. He opens the doors and goes inside, leaving you outside and completely baffled. Your heart is thumping out of control in your chest, your cigarette is long gone, and your mind cannot even form a solid cohesive thought. You look around you for other options, when you spot another jittery shape moving down the lane towards you, and not taking any more chances, you step into the box, unsure of what good it would do, standing in a small box with the stranger.

You scratch that last thought out of your mind, when you step into the box. You look around the white room, which is entirely too big to be making any sense that it is in the same area as the little box you just stepped into. Mouth agape, you quietly study the room, as the doors hum shut behind you, the strange man darting around a central table, making bleeps and bloops.  
“Buhhht, the outside…” was all you could muster. The man looks up at you, almost remembering that you were there, strides over to you and grabs hold of either arm.  
“It is marvelous, isn’t it! You’re safe now, but I do have some questions.” His voice gets grave towards the end of his statement. Your mouth goes dry, unsure of what to say or do first.


	2. Two eggs and a Ham

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some more building, not a whole lot of plot yet, still trying to find the legs to this. BUT that also means this plays out more akin to a Classic Doctor Who story than anything else, and I'm certainly not complaining.  
> Also, I have no idea what is with this and breakfast foods. Always writing on an empty stomach,I suppose!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been rough for me, and I know my head isn't always all here, let me know if there's anything majorly wrong or if I'm missing something obvious!

The man grips your shoulders as you two intently look each other in the eyes, his eyes like darkly vivid sapphires burning right through you. You remind yourself to take deep breaths, trying to control the nausea bubbling up as the events leading you here finally sinking in. Your expression changes from the shock of the dimensional shift in the room, to a twisted look of disquiet. The man moves his hands to either side of your face, his manner moving from grave seriousness to one of soft concern, sensing your distress. Your breathing quickens, as anxiety takes off with your thoughts, and the only thing going through you head at the moment is to get out of there. But you can’t, your body is frozen in place, looking at the strange man.  
“I need you to slow your breathing down, your mind is slowly realizing what is going on, and its going into shock.” The man says, you can barely feel his hands moving to move to the back of your head, cradling it.  
You attempt to open your mouth to say something, ask what is going on, who he is, or even where you were. But as terror kept its firm grip on you, and squeezed tighter, neither of those came out.  
“I’m sorry.” Your voice quiet and choked, tears start streaming down your face. The man sucks in a breath, darts his eyes towards the door behind you, but quickly returns to your face. He moves close to you, as close as he can manage without actually touching you. You close your eyes, unsure of what to expect, or where to look, his eyes almost painful to look at and your whole body tenses.  
“I won’t hurt you, I promise. Just keep breathing, I’m just going to try and help with your anxiety. You’re safe.” He whispers, thumbs gently rubbing the side of your head. You swallow hard, and nod, still unsure of what exactly was going to happen, tears still rolling. The man leans his head forward, gently pressing your foreheads together. His skin feels cool against yours, and as you take a deep breath your thoughts slow down, like they’re being held in Jell-O, and you notice your heart rate returning to a normal pace.  
‘You’re in safe hands now, you are out of danger.’ A voice enters your mind, it isn’t yours and it startles you. You take a step back, the man’s hands move away from your head, and his expression is neutral. You take another step away, unsure of what happened, but thankful that whatever he did has managed to keep you feeling calm.  
“Who are you, and what… what did you do? Was that your voice I heard?” You ask, brain searching for something familiar to latch onto. The man puts his hands by his side and he looks apprehensive.  
“I’m the Doctor, and all I did was telepathically connect with you to try and calm you down, it was my voice you heard, sometimes voices can audibly transfer when linked telepathically. If you’d like, have a seat and gather your thoughts, but if my hunch is correct, we’re about to be in trouble if we don’t leave.” He gives a small smile, walking backwards to the slanted table filled with screens and buttons. You slowly nod, turning to see two patio chairs adjoining a table with a pitcher and glasses. Sitting down, you can hear the Doctor pressing buttons, sounds from behind you. You sigh, not even sure what time it is anymore, but you are feeling exhausted, the anxiety alone could be blamed for that, and leaning back in the chair, you close your eyes drifting off to sleep, the hum of the room providing pleasant white noise.  
The Doctor finishes darting about the console in the room, only to look over at his passenger to see them drifted off to sleep without much fuss. The young looking man smiles, his long hair still a mess, he strides over to the cluster of chairs, ensuring you’re sleeping peacefully and without any sort of visible stress. The wall closest to him produces a small container from within, he gently opens the door, revealing that it is a chest filled with thick and pillowy blankets. Gingerly placing the soft blue blanket on top of you, he turns to leave, the room creating doors on the adjacent wall. The door quietly whooshes shut, the room humming to itself, with you sound asleep, safe from any outside harm.

You awake with a gasp, feeling as if you are truant to some important thing. Frowning and looking around, the room seems foreign to you. Sitting properly upright, the blanket on top of you shifting, you try and take in your surroundings, but you realize you haven’t left the room you were rushed into last night. Last night, was it last night? You weren’t entirely sure, you feel like you’re in a classroom where time doesn’t go anywhere. Standing, bringing the blanket with you, as some sort of downy plush armor, part of the blanket drags as you walk toward the center object in the room. It was a slanted sort of counter, with a clear pillar out the top, and on the angled surfaces were buttons, speakers, dials and screens, and nothing made sense.  
“Ah, awake and curious. Perfect.” A voice sounds from behind you. Clutching the blankets tighter, spinning to face the voice, you press into one of the sides of the table, a button digging into the blanket. You could have sworn that there wasn’t a door anywhere just a moment go, yet a man was standing against a doorjamb that melts in with the rest of the wall. Staring at him for a few more moments, you realize it is the man that saved you, but saved you from what?  
“Where am I?” you ask, your throat feeling dry and as soon as the words leave, you lift a hand keeping him from responding for another moment, “A TARDIS? Is that what this place is?”  
The man hums in response, confirming your memory, sticking his hands in the pockets of his pants and walking toward you. Finally getting a good look at his outfit, you are almost unsure how he could seem so confident, wearing the strange getup he had on; striped pants, a sweater, question marks on his collar, beige long coat with salmon accents, and… and was that CELERY on his coat lapel? Unable to stop it before it happens, you frown, stopping the Doctor a couple of feet away from you.  
“It’s the outfit, isn’t it?” He pushes his coat back to place his hands on his hips, disapproving, “Well, it’s a sight better than wandering about wearing a blanket.” He laughs, poking fun at you. You knit your eyebrows together, something still not making sense.  
“Why did you grab me last night? I didn’t feel like I was in danger last night, it seemed like some neighborhood kids were just having some fun.” You tighten the blanket.  
“Your sort never seem to know when danger is afoot, do you? Hm.” He, says, turning away from you and walking to the side of the console with a screen, pretending to busy himself. “Your neighborhood was under attack by something called Autons. I was trying to track their main consciousness when I ran into you. You didn’t punch me as soon as you saw me, so I figured it would be best to get you out of that situation.” He looks at you, “However many dangerous situations that might be.” His voice quiet, the Doctor’s face suddenly stony and cold. Your breath stops, as a chill runs down your spine. And in a blink, the Doctor smiles. “Anyway, I’m sure you’re well past famished and could use some food, and I do believe we are in the right spot.” He cooly leans against the machine, trying to look smooth. Your thoughts stop for a second, trying to think about food, and you slowly nod.  
“Food sounds great, yeah.” You straighten yourself, getting off the button that had started to dig into your thigh, and as you remove the pressure from the button, a light goes on that goes unnoticed.  
“Okay!” he claps his hands together, causing you to flinch slightly at the sudden noise, “Now I won’t object if you brought it with, but this place is a bit more fancy than a blanket shawl sort of place.” The Doctor pulls a sarcastic pout, making you flush slightly, realizing you might look a bit childish wrapped in a giant fluffy blanket. You half fold it and walk back towards the cluster of chairs, where you find your bag and hat, neatly perched on top. Turning around to face the Doctor as you sling the bag across your shoulder, you find him staring at dials and screens.  
“So, wait. You said we’re somewhere with a restaurant? We moved?” You ask, getting closer to him. Turning his body towards you, but his eyes never leaving the screen they’re locked on to, the Doctor nods.  
“You’re keeping up, good. And if I’m seeing this right,” he pushes a red lever up, causing two doors to open behind him, “we should have plenty of time to catch the breakfast at this place yet.” He finally looks at you, and flashes a crooked smile, looking too pleased with himself. The best response you can muster is an expression of dubiety. The Doctor turns to the now open doors, pulling out a folded hat from his pocket, which opened up as he shook it and placed it on his head, he walks out.  
“Don’t doubt for a second that I’ll have breakfast without you!” He shouts from just outside the doors. You sigh, and walk quickly to catch up. Stepping beyond the doors of the odd box, the bright sun (you think there might be two suns?) blinds you, causing you to squint. Looking around and walking forward, you run right into the Doctor, and looking at him, he has his hands up. Your eyes widen, realizing something is wrong because the Doctor’s face has lost all playfulness and is now solemn and somewhat angry.  
“You too, human, hands up.” A strange voice calls out, freezing you.  
“Do as he says, please. I would like to not have a huge confrontation with him at this point.” The Doctor says quietly to you, never taking his eyes off the man. As you raise your hands, you turn towards the man, who you now see is wearing all black, his facial details obscured by the sun in your eyes.  
“Who is he?” You ask, fear rising in you.  
“I am known as the Master, and you will obey.” The strange man says, in one of his gloved hands, a tubular object pointed at you and the Doctor.  
“Obey?” Your voice echoes in your mind.


End file.
